I know preseason doesn’t count for anything, but here’s a little tip, Ducks.

A fair amount of people (thank god I wasn’t one of them!) paid regular-season prices to see what might have been Chris Pronger’s first game in the Duck uniform (against the cross-town rivals, no less!). Instead they paid regular-season prices to see a prospect squad half-ass its way to the team’s worst individual-game result since the lockout.

If you want to generate some local excitement about this year’s chances , if you want a fanbase of repeat customers who will pay to attend games, try not to fuck ‘em on the first day of school.

They may be fake games with apparently fake hype, but it is not fake money we’re spending.

See ya Wednesday for a better effort,

Sleek

[EDIT: Though I appear to have lost the ability to comment there, Duck's Blog has some firsthand reaction to the game. Also, Dan Wood of the OC Register has begun his own MSM Ducks blog today--that has some promise.][EDIT2: Another entry on Mr. Wood's blog indicates that tomorrow's lineup against SJ will feature J.S. Giguere, S. Niedermayer, C. Pronger, F. Beauchemin, T. Selanne, A. McDonald, R. Getzlaf, C. Perry, D. Penner, T. Marchant, T. Fedoruk, and S. Chistov. I sure got lucky in picking which preseason game to attend!]

My wife wanted to go to the pre-season opener here in Columbus the other day, but I said "no" for precisely this reason. I won't pay regular season prices for what amounts to a glorified scrimmage.

NHL hockey is a business, and I understand this. Baseball teams are able to charge considerably less for spring training games I would guess because they are in minor league stadiums. But I imagine that football (a bad financial comparison for hockey due to its extreme popularity in the USA) and basketball hold their exhibition games in the same venues as the regular season.

It would be nice if hockey would slash prices in half for pre-season since the quality of play is rarely up to regular season standards, but I know that will never happen.

Im surprised you guys are playing RS ticket prices for exhibition games...

That said, it's really hard for anyone to predict pre-season game results, GM's included. The Flames iced a squad featuring exactly none of their stars on Sunday but won the game 3-1 anyways. They could have just as easily lost 7-1 though.

If you want to see an ugly line-up, check out the Canucks Im going to have to watch play the Flames tonight. Ugh. At least my tickets were cheap.

I paid $18 each for my tickets. The seats are located somewhere in stratosphere...but you can still see the ice, which is all that matters (and Im fairly certain even those tickets are pricier than 18 bones during the regular season)...

Im not certain what the prices are like down in the lower bowl (if they're even available)...